A-Viking (Betrayed by Faith Book 3)

by Paul C. Middleton

  “They’re the doorway, mate. We know they have contact with other factions. Even some of the really big ones. But we have to prove we’re willing to act. Give ‘em a push. And have a plan. First, we’ll see if this Griffin is on the up and up. Then we’ll decide if his plan has any good points.”

  “Rufus, Blue, Todd. Gather the boys. Get ‘em to Mount Victoria. There’s a decent pub there, with a quiet back room. The rest of us’ll be there when he goes down on that safe-house. If it’s a trap, we’ll get Joy out. If it ain’t, we’ll bear witness like she asks.”

  He turned to Joy. “I hope you're right, Mother Superior. It’s getting harder n’ harder to hide from ‘em. Best we fight now if we can find a chance.”

  “Grey, I wouldn’t have brought him here if I didn’t see that chance. We ain’t likely to get another either.”

  Edge of Lithgow, Order Safehouse, March 12, 2014.

  Grey’s sedan had followed them to the edge of town. Griffin had pulled over in the last rest stop before Lithgow and gotten out of the car. Two reasons. First, he really needed to piss. Second, they needed to wait for midnight

  Once he’d answered nature's call, he got food out of the car. Eating it, he waited for the people in the other vehicle to get curious or impatient. When they got out of the vehicle, it was evident that it was the latter.

  “Why the delay, big man?” the youngest said in an insulting tone. Griffin just shrugged and kept eating. By now Joy had come back to the car, and she scowled whenever one of the three glared at Griffin. Once they were the only people in the rest stop, Griffin turned to the youngster and answered him. It was already dark, but still two hours before he wanted to attack the house.

  “Because I’m not a suicide, kid. I know their tactics and procedures. That gives me one really good chance at carrying this out. I won’t waste it going off half-cocked.”

  The two more experienced men chuckled at that.

  “Two AM is the best time to strike. Xandrie will have extra people getting up half an hour from then. We slept late today, so I’ll still have the steam for several hours. They’ll be confused by an attack at all, let alone when the book says there shouldn’t be one. ‘Before midnight or after three am’ is what their book says. I should know. I wrote it.” That comment elicited more quiet chuckles. While a smart opponent would take that into account and re-write the book, things like that took time. Changing people’s routines and patterns of behavior took longer still.

  “Brianna and I will take out the external guard with the crossbow and bow.” He checked his watch. “Now is the time to saddle up. We’ll be parking a couple of blocks away from the house. This is my job. I should have dealt with this psychopath long before now.”

  Griffin geared up and threw the car keys to Joy. He left the sword and axe clear of their sheaths on his belt. At least the safe house would have coats for covering this stuff. He was hoping hard that the police didn’t do a random patrol of the area while he was approaching or during the entry.

  Once they reached the house, he waved all the others to take cover in the bushes. He set and strung the bow, and Brianna moved up next to him with the loaded crossbow. He was half kneeling, his silhouette broken by the bushes before him. Once the guard came around the corner, he nocked the arrow but held his position. As the guard turned from scanning the area, Griffin rose, drew back the arrow and fired it in one smooth motion. Just after he loosed, he heard the twang on Brianna’s crossbow shot.

  The guard fell against the house with a loud thump. Griffin cursed and charged the house, moving to the side door as a light came on inside. Brianna followed him as closely as she could while reloading the crossbow. With his injured leg kicking down the door wasn’t really an option, and he wanted no injury to his shoulder either so he focused on the locks in it and blasted them with pure force from the Etheric. They shattered, and the door swung open with the tinkle of metal fragments hitting the ground. Griffin directed Brianna to cover the back end of the house, where there were two rooms, with her crossbow.

  He moved towards the front room. There would be six or seven lay members with Xandrie. Going door to door, he blasted them open and, whether the person inside was standing or not, clocking them on the head with the back of his axe. He didn’t really care if they were dead or alive. He just cared that Xandrie died tonight. In the rooms at the front of the house, he accounted for five, two of whom had impressive wounds on their shoulders. Griffin had to wonder what had caused them, but it was only a brief surprise. At least the internal doors had no locks.

  Xandrie had to be upstairs or out the back. He heard the twang of Brianna’s crossbow and the rattle of it hitting the floor. She’d either missed, or there were two people in the back of the house. Griffin rushed down the hallway to the back of the house. There was a click of light being switched on, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust. He saw a blue-haired woman strike at him just in time to block the blow. As he looked around the room he saw Brianna backing away, the Gladius drawn.

  Xandrie growled in frustration. “You. I’ll finally get to punish you for all the times you’ve stood in the way of the actual purpose of the Order, Griffin. We should have exterminated their kind centuries ago.”

  “So I should either never have been born or be killed, eh? I’m one of them Xandrie. Most Paladins probably are. They’ve been using us to kill our own.” Griffin said to her. Xandrie simply sneered. “Though I hope by all that is honest in the world you aren’t.”

  The combined living, kitchen and dining room was large and sparsely furnished. Griffin moved into it and taunted Xandrie by holding his axe at his side and his short sword behind his back. He stood there, every moment an extra insult to the rage-filled woman. His anger flowed like ice in his veins, sharpening his perceptions. That was how he saw her coming. She charged him suddenly, but he was ready. He sidestepped her movement, deflected the strike and whacked her on the arse with the flat of the axe. He wanted her to feel defeated when he took her down.

  Xandrie circled him cautiously, feinting in and dodging back. He caught her blade in the angle of his axe head and haft, but she slid it out before he could disarm her. Grinning to herself, it seemed to her Griffin was slowing down. His cold mind noticed the flicker on her face. She’d take that bait, sooner or later.

  Eventually, sick of the bickering feints, parries, and thrusts, she feinted forward then spun, dramatically changing the angle of the thrust. Griffin parried it with the short sword, throwing her off balance long enough for him to capture her blade again. This time he didn’t give her a chance to withdraw the blade, disarming her with a sharp flick that caused her to grunt in pain as her wrist was twisted by the motion.

  She stepped back to draw her dagger, desperation flickering onto her face, but she was too late. Griffin darted forward and slashed across her belly, causing her guts to slide out onto the floor. Xandrie gasped in pain and shock, but Griffin wasn’t finished. He shoved his blade up into her chest. After hooking the sword into the sternum by locking it into the hilt, he braced a foot against her hip and wrenched it out taking the sternum with it.

  Xandrie collapsed to her knees, unable to scream in pain as the terrible damage made her desperately want to. There was too much pain. Then Griffin took a mighty swing with his axe and cleaved her head from her shoulders. It hit the ground with a dull thump. Griffin dropped to a knee as his thigh gave out again.

  A couple of minutes later he heard footsteps at the doors. The rooms at the front of the house were checked, and there was the gurgling sound of a throat being slit. Griffin looked down the hallway and saw a man with a crossbow bolt through the eye. He sighed. Six. That would be the whole team.

  There were murmurs from the men, then one of them walked up to him, the leader.

  “I’m Grey. I can see you really didn’t like her. None of us did either… she was known by reputation. A blue-haired lass with a Katana has to be fairly unique. So you’ve earned enough trust to at least give us your
plan. But what do you want to do with this?”

  “Leave it. We’ll prop something against the side door to keep it shut and leave by the front. Chuck the corpses in the back rooms… except for hers. When she doesn’t respond by noon tomorrow, the Order or someone… probably from the St. Michael’s abbey in the mountains will investigate. I want them to know what I did. I want them to fear what I might do. Perhaps some of the lay-brothers and Paladins may leave it. Perhaps not. But they declared war by killing a pregnant woman.” Griffin answered, his voice grim.

  “A baby, born or otherwise, is an innocent. Killing one says the Order has changed its mission. They’ve gone from containment to extermination. Normal humans will be caught up in this. Making the Order fear will, at least, give us a chance to hit them before they start moving through the massive lists of ‘watched.'”

  “Well, if you convince all of us that your plan has merit when we get together at Mount Victoria, I’m with you. We should clean up and leave, though.” Griffin nodded and started to rise to his feet. Grey shook his head. “Nah, we got this. You did the heavy lifting, we can do the moving.”

  Order Safehouse, March 12, 2014.

  Xandrie didn’t lose consciousness when her head hit the ground. The pain she was feeling was immense, but she couldn’t scream. She tried really, really hard to. To voice the pain would be relief in and of itself.

  One man in the room was speaking “… and we’ll meet them in Mount Victoria.” He said. Then they moved corpses around the chamber. She shut her eyes. Why was she still alive? No-one should still be alive after losing their head… literally. Once there was no further sound of footsteps, she opened her eyes and looked around as well as she was able. She could see her body. It was brutalized, The chest cavity open, her innards scattered across about a meter square of floor. It sickened her.

  But why was she still here?

  She tried to move her hand, and it twitched slightly, but pain screamed through her brain again. The body on the floor jerked convulsively.

  Why was she still here? Had she followed the wrong path and been barred entry not only to Heaven and Purgatory but also Hell?

  **********************************************************

  Nin had sensed his signature. It was to the north, and she could focus on the residual resonance his multiple uses of the Etheric had left. She went to wake Rinzen.

  “It’s time… He’s using his abilities again. We need to head north.” She knew he might be gone by the time they got there, but it was better than nothing. And eventually, they’d be close enough to find him when he used his abilities. At least that was her hope.

  After traveling an hour north from where they’d been stopped, they drove block by block. After looking for about fifteen minutes, Nin narrowed it down to a single house. The only place in town where any powers had been used for days… at least none she could sense. And there was more than one user there… Someone in the house was still drawing on the planes.

  And it wasn’t her lifemate.

  When she walked into the house, she found a blood bath. And a headless body with the lips still moving.

  An Ossirian. Damn. Her guts were all over the floor, her chest was cut wide open. It was not a pretty sight, to say the least. But she might know more about Nin’s lifemate. Who he was and where he was going.

  If she had to guess, her lifemate was responsible for this individual’s state, though. Did she have a right to undo what he’d done to this person?

  Would she be able to find him if she didn’t? Or would she always be one step behind him?

  She found a clean area of the floor and sat down to think. On the edge of her awareness, she heard Rinzen running from room to room. Then she heard the emptying of her stomach and the flush of a toilet. Evidently, Rinzen hadn’t seen violence of this level before. Nin had. All too often. Her brothers had encouraged fanaticism and cruelty amongst their followers, and it had remained a part of the human condition.

  She considered all the angles. Finally, she walked up to the head. The fact that the skin color hadn’t changed was an indication that this was the first time she’d been… killed so to speak. It usually took four or five deaths for the Ossirians to get the hang of putting themselves back together.

  With that thought, she realized all she’d be doing is speeding up the process. This woman would, eventually, come back together. Unless Nin cut her up further and burnt her. So she spoke to the head.

  “Okay. Three questions, then an offer. Blink twice for yes. Once for no. Do you know who did this to you?” Two blinks. A yes. “Do you have any idea where he’s headed?” Two blinks again. “Do you know why you aren’t dead?” One blink. “Okay. I can put you back together, but I’ll only do that if you will tell me who did this and where he was going. Along with your promise to leave him alone once you are… together again. Can we agree on that?” There was a long pause. Then she blinked twice again.

  “Okay. Now hold in any screams while I do this. It’ll take a while and may hurt considerably. But the last thing either of us wants is neighbors coming in.” Nin turned to see Rinzen, her face still green, standing there. “See if you can find me something to stick her back together again. Some needle and thread or something. This is gonna take a while.”

  First Nin checked to see most of the internal organs were still relatively in place. All things considered. Only her intestines were spread on the floor. Nin knelt beside the body, near the intestines and started carefully feeding them back into the area they belonged, making sure there were no punctured or cut areas, no kinks or tangles. She heard Rinzen run for the bathroom again.

  It took here at least three hours to piece Xandrie back together. She really wasn’t sure how long, but as dawn was cracking through the windows, Rinzen had closed them. She’d also found Nin some medical superglue to use to put everything back together.

  Nin had to channel energy into the woman’s ribcage to get it to re-form properly. The sound of the bones knitting that fast was hideous. It was a combination of hundreds of nails scraping on a chalkboard and a cracking sound of branches tearing away from trees. Finally, there was reattaching the head. Eventually, after about twelve hours, she got some movement back in the head. While they were waiting, Nin explained to Xandrie what she was. What they were, in a way.

  Then, after Rinzen had gone through the house and piled up the Bibles present, she’d gone off on a rant about her brothers and their stupid theory that they were the Superior beings and deserved to be treated as the one and only God. That they’d used their abilities to convince groups of humans to follow them. That one had killed the other, but eventually, the deception had been found out by regular people, and they had figured out a way to kill her remaining brother.

  When she finally found the power of speech again, Xandrie told them two things. Griffin and Mount Victoria. Nin smiled, thanked her and left the house.

  Xandrie sat there, working on regaining movement in her body. She’d need a shower and clothes before she could exit the house, but they were here. Tears rolled down her face as she thought about what both Griffin and Nin had told her. Her life as a brutal murderer, all those people she had tortured to find more Demonspawn. Could it have been a waste? Could they be telling the truth? She should be dead, but she still wasn’t sure either way. There was a need for her to disappear. She needed time.

  She knew Griffin would tear down the Order while she worked things out.

  Mount Victoria, March 15, 2014.

  Nin had become impatient. Rinzen had driven her straight to Mount Victoria, but Nin had no luck finding him.

  It wasn’t like they had any other ideas of where to look for her lifemate.

  Nin had no idea how long she could wait around. She had lost the virtue of patience in her recent past. There was no way she would spend weeks waiting for him to just show up. What was even more irritating was the fact he seemed to refuse to actively use his powers. If he’d just use them, she’d be able to find
him that much faster.

  And what was blocking the lifemate bond from sensing where he was? She was convinced that there was something actively obfuscating his location from her. She could not think of what it could be, and she had more knowledge of Traveller-born than anyone, or she hoped she did. There had to be advantages to being as old as she was. But there was no single or combination of relationships she could think of to explain it. Which meant it was most likely a magi talent.

  Damn. She’d mostly ignored their abilities before going into the dreaming, and viewing them from the Astral didn’t give her the best gauge of what they could do. The Astral was useful in many ways, but it often obscured what a person could do with their personal abilities or how an ability drew on various planes.

  Rinzen walked into the room they were sharing. “Nin, come on, let's at least get a meal at the pub next door. You can get something bland, but you need to get out. Obsessing over if he’ll come here is not helping you. Relax for the night. There isn’t much else you can do. Have a drink and let your hair down,” Rinzen said. “After traveling with you for the last couple of months, I can tell you, behaving this focused won’t impress anyone. It’s actually a little creepy by today’s standards. Stalkerish.”

  Nin sighed, then shook herself and looked at Rinzen. She might be right. All this was winding her up tighter and tighter, like a bowstring being wound for waxing, just before it was strung on its bow. She still had four more days to her self-imposed timeline before they’d look anywhere else. “Okay, but you pick out what I’m to wear. You always criticize my choices. I guess I don’t understand modern fashion.” Nin sighed again. “I’d be lost without you, you know. None of the modern clothes really make sense to me.”

  Rinzen chuckled. It was the little things Nin had admitted defeat on. Learning a language? She already knew many of the world's languages from her dreaming. But the minutiae of etiquette and fashion seemed to be beyond her. It often seemed like she was a foreigner trying to hide in a strange land, and in a way she was. The problem wasn’t a strange land, but a different time and the differences in societies that brought with it. At least with etiquette, she seemed to just be overly formal, perhaps from a strict family upbringing if a person didn’t know better. With fashion, she’d be a disaster, oscillating between way too formal to, well, not enough fabric. She seemed to consider both long skirts and jeans torture devices. And she insisted on wearing a corset, once she’d found they could still be bought, instead of a bra. Modern corsets were so much nicer than their medieval counterparts. Although she may have a point on bras being the worst of modern clothing’s torture devices.